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Show HN: Tool that turns your images into plotter-like line drawings

405 pointsby javierbyteabout 4 years ago

28 comments

bitwise-evanabout 4 years ago
Nice! I did something like this a long time ago: <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;theartbot.com" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;theartbot.com</a> I wrote a couple algorithms but the best one basically treated the darkness of the image like the altitude in a map, then drew contour lines. I also physically built the plotter.
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vladstudioabout 4 years ago
Hint: generate 2 or 3 images from the same photo with different &quot;Lines&quot; settings, then stack them with &quot;multiply&quot; blend mode and some color overlays. Example: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;cdn.vlad.studio&#x2F;d376f5d1f3e3142028e2bfb8da134346.png" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;cdn.vlad.studio&#x2F;d376f5d1f3e3142028e2bfb8da134346.png</a>
NelsonMinarabout 4 years ago
There&#x27;s a fun and vibrant plotter art community clustered around the AxiDraw and similar low cost at-home plotters. Lots of fun stuff, including several image converters like this.<p>Just yesterday I was playing with the Flow Imager plugin for VPype. Similar trick of using line density, but in this case it&#x27;s using a randomized curved flowfield for texture. The fun thing is the experimental &quot;flow along image edges&quot; feature where you get some lines tracing edges in the original picture. <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;serycjon&#x2F;vpype-flow-imager" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;serycjon&#x2F;vpype-flow-imager</a>
jvanderbotabout 4 years ago
Just a warning. If you upload your own headshot in the standard light-on-light linkedin background style. You <i>will</i> come out looking like a horror film drawing. There isn&#x27;t enough contrast so it makes your face very dark and jagged.<p>I love it.
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ev1about 4 years ago
For anyone on Brave or Firefox with protection enabled: you have to turn it off, because canvas randomisation will just result it in it permanently drawing a mess of lines covering the entire square forever.
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roland35about 4 years ago
This is great! I just created a pen holding adapter for my 3d printer so I can do some plots. I still need to find a good way to efficiently convert SVG files to gcode, but this will be a good start.<p>Inkscape has a gcode generation tool, but it requires some tweaks to work on my prusa 3d printer. Still a work in progress!
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dukeofdoomabout 4 years ago
I used to do kind of the opposite art&#x2F;bored in class thing. Doodle a bunch of random loops and lines. Then see if I could see a graphic of something in there. Sort of my own rorschach test. Then try to bring out that image by going over those lines. I can&#x27;t be the only one to do this.
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blhackabout 4 years ago
WOW this is cool! Going to take these files and put them into my lasercutter to see what I get. Really really cool thing!
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buixuanquyabout 4 years ago
You can check this work, very beautiful<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;ColCarroll&#x2F;imcmc" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;ColCarroll&#x2F;imcmc</a>
petercooperabout 4 years ago
Along similar lines, does anyone know of any good way to turn images into &#x27;hedcut&#x27; WSJ style art? I&#x27;ve seen a few attempts but they don&#x27;t tend to be very good, but it feels like something that&#x27;s solvable, even if with a GAN or something.
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why55about 4 years ago
Needs more turtles. <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.m.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Turtle_graphics" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.m.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Turtle_graphics</a>
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atum47about 4 years ago
Cool concept. I was trying to develop something along those lines. I&#x27;d like to feed an image to an algorithm and have it draw it, like this: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=b8mwFDJgWR0" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=b8mwFDJgWR0</a> (but better)
ourcatabout 4 years ago
Nice. This reminds me a lot of the &#x27;String Art Generator&#x27; <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;halfmonty&#x2F;StringArtGenerator" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;halfmonty&#x2F;StringArtGenerator</a> to recreate &#x27;Pin and Thread&#x27; art.<p>Also see a &#x27; weaving algorithm&#x27; here : <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;i-make-robots&#x2F;weaving_algorithm" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;i-make-robots&#x2F;weaving_algorithm</a>
reputetabout 4 years ago
The drawing process looks similar to the Venom transformation!<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;youtu.be&#x2F;ph26HHK9FZg?t=36" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;youtu.be&#x2F;ph26HHK9FZg?t=36</a>
ash_devabout 4 years ago
cool concept, struggling to get good facial definitions.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;a.tmp.ninja&#x2F;obxwcfzK.png" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;a.tmp.ninja&#x2F;obxwcfzK.png</a>
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clcaevabout 4 years ago
Last month there was a lovely PlutoCon talk by Paul Butler on turning a picture into a plot.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;m.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=L2KdOJRR3Vo" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;m.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=L2KdOJRR3Vo</a><p>His notebook is at <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;plutocon2021-demos.netlify.app&#x2F;paulbutler_penplottingwithpluto" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;plutocon2021-demos.netlify.app&#x2F;paulbutler_penplottin...</a>
jonahabout 4 years ago
Hijacking this post a bit, but does anyone know of a library or API service to convert SVGs to PLT (AutoCad Plotter format, based on HPGL) files. I need them to feed to a laser engraver.<p>I found convertio[o], but it doesn&#x27;t support SVG embedded fonts so the text defaults to Times.<p>[0] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;convertio.co&#x2F;svg-plt&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;convertio.co&#x2F;svg-plt&#x2F;</a>
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Asposabout 4 years ago
Using mobilenet to detect facial features. Smart! Would suggest to go one step further and remove background before processing the face.
pfd1986about 4 years ago
I wonder if the number of lines can be a measure of Kolmogorov complexity for an image...<p>Neat idea regardless.
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wodenokotoabout 4 years ago
I dabbled with making something similar (transparent colored triangles, instead of lines), and had a lot of trouble getting something good.<p>Are there any text describing theories for doing this, or does everybody just trial and error their way through?
jankovicsandrasabout 4 years ago
Cool.<p>Shameless plug: public domain image vectorizer<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;jankovicsandras&#x2F;imagetracerjs" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;jankovicsandras&#x2F;imagetracerjs</a>
zoom6628about 4 years ago
Nice way to generate images as headshots for accounts.
heliophobicdudeabout 4 years ago
Great work!<p>Does anyone have any plotter recommendations?
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daniellarussoabout 4 years ago
Pretty cool! Nice work, dude.
dmjeabout 4 years ago
Love it, that&#x27;s ace, thanks for posting!
icemooonalmost 4 years ago
Love it! That’s really cool
diehundeabout 4 years ago
Pretty cool! Too bad most of my photos are in HEIC format and the site won&#x27;t load them.
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torhabout 4 years ago
Impressive. Very artsy.